Regardless of how well rookie Lonzo Ball plays, Lakers president of basketball operations Magic Johnson and the rest of the organization likely realize they’re still in the early stages of rebuilding. (Photo by Scott Varley, Daily Breeze/SCNG)

Remember last season when hope was born again? The Las Vegas line put their over-under at 24.5 wins and they got 26.

This season’s over-under is all the way up to 33.5. Unfortunately for the Lakers, if they beat it by 1.5 again, it’s not going to put them back in contention.

Of course, they’re rebuilding but that covers a varity of experiences, like, say, Minnesota’s envy-of-all Timberwolves landing Andrew Wiggins and Karl-Anthony Towns, the No. 1 picks in 2014 and 2015, then trading for Jimmy Butler and signing Jeff Teague.

The Lakers are like the other half of a before-and-after ad. They had the No. 2 picks in 2015 and 2016, neither of whom turned out to be Towns or even Wiggins.

Instead, they took D’Angelo Russell, a converted point guard at Ohio State who didn’t turn out to be converted or mature enough; and twiggy Brandon Ingram, management’s favorite among their young players before the arrival of Ball and Kuzma, but a player who has yet to show he’ll be a star.

We’ll soon be finding out how special Ball and Ingram are and whether Kuzma can really be better for the Lakers than he was for the Utah Utes.

Kuzma’s surprise emergence has led to the questions Coach Luke Walton gets about whether he fits better in the pros than in college.

Then there are the fantasy questions in which fans now impressed by advanced analytics – as Doc Rivers notes, what we once merely called “stats” – ask if Kuzma is getting the benefit of the dreaded “SSS,” small sample size.

Duh. Few players fit better in the NBA facing bigger, better and more athletic players than they did in college.

As far as what constitutes a big enough sample size, you can’t even count the preseason. You can make every shot – Kuzma made 62 percent in his first four games, averaging 19.5 points off the bench – but nothing counts until opening night.

Of course, you’d rather your kids do well than poorly or, worse, arrive so attitudinal that the coach won’t play them … like Russell’s rookie season when Coach Byron Scott caught hell for insisting he earn his playing time.

Whatever else Ball is, he’s a gifted play-maker as he showed with an eye-popping performance in Las Vegas that included the only two triple-doubles in the last 10 years of summer ball.

He also had a 36-point, 11-rebound game before leaving his last one at halftime with 14 points and 10 assists after pulling a muscle in his calf whereupon the Lakers shut him down.

Few remembered what a hard call taking Lonzo at No. 2 was for Magic Johnson, with his funky shot and skeptics even among UCLA insiders, not to mention Josh Jackson and Jayson Tatum, the red-hot prospects behind him.

Jackson went to Phoenix at No. 3, but not before the Lakers took a long look at him. Boston GM Danny Ainge liked Tatum so much, he traded down from No. 1 to take him at No. 4, letting the 76ers have top-rated Markelle Fultz.

With Lonzo as low-key as his father is grandiose, the Big Baller paterfamilias won’t be a problem if he learns to zip it up even if it takes a few debacles like Kentucky’s De’Aaron Fox saying he outscored Lonzo, 39-10, in the NCAA Tournament “to shut LaVar Ball up.”

Lavar’s lone preseason furor was announcing he would home school LaMelo, which was only a problem for Chino Hills High, not the Lakers.

Unfortunately for the Lakers, Lonzo sprained an ankle in the second game and there went his preseason, meaning he’s even farther behind realizing his great expectations.

One day the Lakers have to be the team that makes the call everyone envies. Without next spring’s No. 1, which finally goes to Philadelphia to complete the Steve Nash deal, it had better be Lonzo.

A Western Conference GM told me last spring that he was so conflicted, he held a video marathon to study Lonzo … and came away thinking he’ll be very good.

Rebounding does translate, signaling anticipation and physicality. Steals suggest anticipation and effort at that end. Assists suggest ball handling, vision, maturity and feel for the game.

“That play-making stuff he does absolutely translates from college to the pros,” an Eastern Conference scout told me of Lonzo last week.

If years of rebuilding have been hard on Lakers fans – with more on tap! – things could be worse as well as better.

Rebuilding is now often called “The Process,” shorthand for Joel Embiid’s injury-plagued career … while the 76ers tanked for three consecutive seasons and finally fired GM Sam Hinkie, who insisted this was business as usual.

Then there are the Knicks, who finally acknowledged they have to rebuild last week when Coach Jeff Hornacek said he wouldn’t sacrifice the process “just to win some games.”

What a ship of fools. They couldn’t even figure out what they were doing in time to announce it on media day when camp opened.

A year ago, Hornacek said you couldn’t rebuild in glamour markets like New York or Los Angeles after Knicks president Phil Jackson brought in Joakim Noah and Derrick Rose. They then went 31-51.

Phil is no longer with them but the problem is bigger: owner James Dolan, who got his job the old-fashioned way – his father put him in charge – and has seen his teams miss the playoffs in all but four of his 17 seasons.

Hey, the Lakers cashed out Jim Buss last season, too! So hope abounds in Lakerdom, however briefly it lasts this season, or how far away they are from free agency next spring, or how early they are in this process.

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